The L sound!

Sometimes the L sound is a tricky one for kiddos! If your child has been working on the L sound in speech therapy or if you've noticed at home that your child has difficulty saying words with the L sound in them, here are a few quick tips/activities you could try.
*The most common substitution for /l/ (the LLLL sound) is /w/ ("Wuh") which results in producing "weaf" instead of "leaf." This is a phonological process/error pattern called "gliding."*

-Show your child how to make their tongue go "UP UP UP" in his/her mouth by pointing to your own tongue as you raise it UP to the roof of your mouth behind your top teeth.

-say "la la la" like you are "singing" (sometimes we refer to /l/ as the "singing sound")

-gently touch the roof of your child's mouth behind the top teeth (we call this the "alveolar ridge") to show them WHERE exactly to put their tongue (we call this a "tactile prompt" or a touch cue)

Below are some picture cards from a blog I found (Testy Yet Trying) that could help shape your home practice.

You could:
-practice all of the words one at a time by simply looking at them on your computer or phone screen,
-print out the pictures and practice them like flash cards,
-print out two copies of the pictures, cut them apart and play a memory/matching game with them
-print out two copies of the pictures, cut them apart and hide them around the house to play a hide and seek type game...then have your child say, "I found ____!" when they find each target picture.
-play a game with your child and have him/her say one of the target words prior to each turn
-produce one of the target words incorrectly (example - say "WAKE" instead of "LAKE" while pointing to the "lake" picture card) and have your child correct your error and show you/tell you how to say the word correctly

(click on the picture to make it larger)

For other sounds, check out THIS PAGE on Testy Yet Trying's blog! (click link!)

Remember - keep things fun and light-hearted while you practice with your littles. 

Happy talking!

~Mrs. Wells

Final Consonant Deletion Activity

In very young children who are just beginning to talk, it is common for them to leave off (or "drop") the final consonant sound. For example, the word "dog" might be produced "do-." As you can imagine, this error pattern can make it difficult to understand what a child is saying.  By the time a child is age three, we like to see this error pattern eliminated (meaning we like to see three year olds producing final consonants in words).

If your 3+ year-old is having difficulty producing final consonants, it's a good idea to chat with a Speech-Language Pathologist to determine if therapy is appropriate and/or if there are things you could do at home to help your child increase final consonant production.  For some children, simply helping him/her LISTEN more critically to notice that there is indeed a sound at the end of a word can help him/her begin to produce these sounds more.

Choose some CVC (consonant vowel consonant) or VC (vowel consonant) words that are meaningful to your child and plan a simple play scheme around one or two of these words.  Every time you produce the target sound, bring extra emphasis to the final sound (produce the sound louder with your voice, clap as you make the sound, tap the child's arm as you make the sound, etc.).  An example activity could be popping bubbles. Blow bubbles with your child and show your child how to POP the bubbles while saying "POP!" "POP!" Make that final /p/ sound extra-loud! Maybe even POP a bubble as you produce that final /p/ sound.

The Speech Chicks, a great SLP blog, has a good free resource for working on final consonants (Click to check it out!):
Final Consonants
I've personally used this resource with some of my students and really like it!

Happy talking :)

~Mrs. Wells